C/SG baseball 9 plays 5 games in 5 days

Brady Ambrose/The Caledonia Argus Kyle Sorenson pitched a complete game in the first game of the Warriors double-header with Fillmore-Central last Thursday.

By Brady Ambrose

Caledonia Argus

The Caledonia/Spring Grove Warrior baseball team wrapped up a stretch of five games in five days with a double-header sweep of Fillmore Central at CHS Thursday afternoon.

With the poor weather conditions hampering the entire spring sports schedule, all baseball and softball teams in Minnesota are now playing two, five inning games just to try and make up for lost playing time earlier in the season.

Thursday the Warriors got a pair of solid pitching performances as Kyle Sorenson tossed a complete game with four strikeouts in game one as the Warriors rolled to a 12-3 win. In game two Tanner Langen took the mound and also pitched a gem as he threw a one-hitter with five strikeouts as the Warriors won 5-0.

The two wins saw C/SG climb above the .500 mark at 6-5 overall this season. In the first game, the Warriors scored in every inning with three runs in the first, three in the second, four in the third and four in the bottom of the fourth to cruise to the nine-run win.

Fillmore-Central grabbed a short-lived lead with a run in the top of the first but the Warriors answered quickly as Colton Lampert and Justin Burg singled and Tanner Langen and Josef Pettit both doubled to put the Warriors up 3-1.

Caledonia/Spring Grove then sent eight hitters to the plate in the bottom of the second and increased their lead to 6-1 as they took control of the game. A one out double by Langen scored TJ Schultz and Colton Lampert and Harrison Speltz’s base hit scored Tanner Gran.

Sorenson controlled Fillmore-Central most of the game and struck out Collin Bennett to end the game.

In the second game Tanner Langen gave up a lone base hit to Nick Mensink in the bottom of the fifth inning that broke up a no-hitter that Langen had going through four innings. Josef Pettit went 2×3 with a run scored and Justin Burg was 1×3 with 2 RBIs and a run scored and Tanner Gran was 2×2 in the win. “We hit the ball solid and consistant all night and our pitching and defense were solid also,” said coach Dave Konz.
Brady Ambrose/The Caledonia ArgusHead coach Dave Konz, Harrison Speltz and Tanner Langen enjoy a lighter moment during a break in the Warriors 12-3 win in game one.

The Warriors snapped a three game losing streak May 6 when they beat Rushford-Peterson 5-0 at R-P.

Austin Bauer got the scoring started when he walked with one out in the top of the third inning and moved to third on TJ Schultz’s double to right field and then scored on an error on R-P first baseman Ross Anderson to give C/SG a 1-0 lead.

Schultz advanced to third on the play and Colton Lampert singled scoring Schultz. Lampert then stole second and Harrison Speltz singled with Lampert scoring for a 3-0 lead.

The score remained 3-0 as C/SG starter Tanner Gran was cruising. Gran gave up just one hit through the first four innings before giving up a base hit and a walk in the bottom of the fifth with just one out. But Gran struck out Logan Dittman and got McMannimon-Myers to ground out to end the fifth for the Trojans. The Warriors tacked on two more runs in the sixth. Seth Twite singled to lead off the inning and moved to second on Gran’s sacrifice.

Bauer then grounded out to second to move Twite to third base and after a walk to Schultz, Twite scored on a wild pitch and Schultz moved to second. Schultz then stole third base and scored on an error on R-P catcher Riley Vitse for the 5-0 final. Tanner Langen pitched the sixth inning and Bauer finished the game in the seventh as the Warrior pitching staff gave up just four hits with four strikeouts to get the win. “We rebounded well from the two losses the night before to Southland,” C/SG coach Dave Konz said. “Even though we didn’t have a lot of hits we did hit the ball pretty solid all night.”

Caledonia/Spring Grove opened the week with a pair of home losses to Southland as the Knights beat the Warriors 7-4 in game one of a double-header and then hammered out an 11-1 win in game two. “Two big innings did us in, one in each of the games. We never quite recovered from those two innings,” Konz said.

The Warriors grabbed a 2-0 lead in game one as Tanner Gran scored on a Colton Lampert base hit and TJ Schultz scored on the play as well after singling. Lampert then stole second base and scored when Speltz reached on an error for a 3-0 lead.

The Warriors went up 4-0 in the top of the fourth on a double by Josef Pettit, who moved to third on Seth Twite’s grounder and scored on Tanner Gran’s sacrifice.

But the Knights scored twice in the bottom of the fourth to cut the lead to 4-2 and then scored five runs in the bottom of the fifth on a base hit, an intentional walk, a wild pitch, two errors, another single and finally a two-RBI double from Trent Reinartz to give Southland a 7-4 win.

The wheels then fell off the bus entirely in the next game as Southland tagged Tanner Gran for eight runs on just four hits in the first inning and cruised to an 11-1 win.

Southland sent 13 hitters to the plate in the first inning and quickly took command of the game. C/SG scored their only run in the bottom of the fourth inning as Tanner Langen reached on a fielder’s choice and later scored on Pettit’s two-bagger. But Southland scored twice in the top of the fifth and shut down the Warriors in the bottom half of the inning to win 11-1.

Tanner Gran took the loss while Issac Kloeckner got the win for Southland, giving up four hits and one run with four strikeouts.